1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a liquid crystal display device and an electronic apparatus.
2. Related Art
Liquid crystal display devices had a problem with a narrow viewing angle in the past and a wide viewing angle characteristic has been required therefor. Particularly, this problem is remarkable in applications for televisions or car navigation apparatuses or digital cameras of which display plural persons view. On the contrary, when a user alone views the display, there is a need for not allowing the other persons to view the display. In this case, a narrow viewing angle characteristic has been required. This is true, for example, in applications for notebook PCs or mobile phones used in public places. In recent years, a need for switching the wideness and narrowness of a viewing angle depending on the usage of the same apparatus has increased in cases where TV programs are watched with notebook PCs, games are played with mobile phones, or the like.
For this need, JP-A-5-108023 suggested a method of controlling a viewing angle characteristic by providing a viewing-angle controlling liquid crystal panel in addition to a displaying liquid crystal panel and controlling a voltage supplied to the viewing-angle controlling liquid crystal panel. JP-A-2007-79525 and JP-A-2007-178737 suggested a method of controlling a viewing angle characteristic by providing viewing-angle controlling sub pixels in addition to displaying sub pixels of R (red), G (green), and B (blue) and controlling a voltage supplied to the viewing-angle controlling sub pixels.
However, the method disclosed in JP-A-5-108023 caused a problem in that the thickness of a module is greatly increased due to the addition of the viewing-angle controlling liquid crystal panel. In the method disclosed in JP-A-2007-79525 and JP-A-2007-178737, the thickness is not increased since the viewing-angle controlling sub pixels are provided, but the display of a wide angle could not be completely suppressed by the use of only the viewing-angle controlling sub pixels having the viewing angle control performance smaller than normal displaying sub pixels. That is, the viewing-angle controlling sub pixels cause leakage of light in a wide-angle direction using a change in alignment status of liquid crystal molecules in a direction perpendicular to a substrate, thereby reducing the contrast as viewed in a tilted direction. However, since the light emitted from the viewing-angle controlling sub pixels is weak and has uniform brightness as a whole, the outline of an image is displayed as it is and thus it is not possible to accomplish a sufficient viewing-angle control effect.